Re:Letting users skip our paywall if they wrote an apology
by underwoodley on Tuesday October 31, 2017 @05:17AM
(#15591878)
From an economic point of view, wasting people's time in exchange for a free service is worse than either charging them what the market can bear, or providing a free service. If you charged them, you would benefit. If you didn't charge, the users would benefit. But if you make a demand on their time which doesn't have any benefit for you, both of you are worse off.
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Re:Letting users skip our paywall if they wrote an apology
by jchw on Tuesday October 31, 2017 @05:32AM
(#15591921)
This, to me, seems like a strange way of thinking. They're not 'wasting people's time,' they're making a request of them in exchange for a service.
Instead of turning them away entirely as a full paywall may have, they got some information or at least amusement out of them, and the user still gets their service.
Users benefit either way; the question is whether they have to pay in exchange for it or answer a question in exchange for it. The latter may seem wasteful to you, but clearly it didn't to the owners of that website.